Hearts and Headlines
by Tracy Diane Miller
Summary: Meredith and Gary...a potential romance or a disaster waiting to happen?


Hearts and Headlines  
  
Summary: This very short story, based on "The Paper" and "His Girl Thursday", is a continuation of "Passion Awakened."  
  
Disclaimers: Early Edition characters belong to whoever created them. No copyright infringement intended. No profit is being made.  
  
Author: Tracy Diane Miller E-mail address: tdmiller82@hotmail.com  
  
Hearts and Headlines  
  
The news room finally fell victim to a deafening silence. Quiet. It seemed so bizarre, the silence. The song proclaimed New York as the city that never sleeps, but on most days, the Big Apple had an insomniac twin in the Windy City, or at least in the staff of the Sun-Times. Exhaustion was often countered by the burning desire to uncover a hot story. Reporters were restless and hungry, but never tired.  
  
Yet, now the news room seemingly had surrendered to its own exhaustion. If there were sounds, they were the voices of the lingering shadows of reporters, memories whispered in the air, the ghosts of stories' past. No one was there.  
  
Not true.  
  
She sat at her desk, a small and obscure lamp on the end of the desk her only light. She twisted a ringlet of her dark and curly hair. Was she thinking about a story or was she thinking about...him? Those soft and sexy mud green eyes, that face, boyish good looks peppered with an undercurrent of mischief and mystery, and those lips, so sensual and inviting, had captured her. Here she was a tenacious, lauded, investigative reporter and she was acting like an adolescent. No man had ever affected her in the way that he had.  
  
She was shook from her musings by the sound of cartons of Chinese food placed on the desk. The smell of Moo Goo Gai Pan perfumed the air. Then she looked up and saw him. Their eyes locked.  
  
Magic.  
  
Six weeks had passed since that night, but she hadn't heard from him. That night they had talked, laughed, and even kissed as the remnants of Chinese food sat idly in the cartons unknowing witnesses to a burgeoning love affair. She felt that they were beginning to have something special. What happened? He had suddenly pulled away. Why?  
  
She stared at her blank computer squeezing one of those rubber stress release balls, the brooding, star reporter now being mocked by a blinking cursor. "BH" (Before Hobson), her stories were Pulitzer Prize caliber. "AH" (After Hobson), well, after Hobson's disappearing act, his Houdini stunt, she was writing powder puff stuff. Hawks told her that she needed to pull herself together because Washington was interested, but they were interested in a tough reporter not a love sick girl writing powder puff stuff.  
  
Hawks was right. She was mooning over Hobson. One lousy date. Chinese food then nothing. Hawks suggested that she call Hobson. She already had. Hawks told her to try something else. She did.  
  
"Toddler falls in front of L train" the headline screamed. She knew that would be enough to bring him out of hiding. She waited on the platform. She didn't have a long time to wait. He appeared, his eyes fixed intently on the headline. He sprung into action. So did she. He wanted to take care of the story. She wanted to know what happened. One date and goodbye Gary. Nothing happened he insisted. She kissed him. He didn't resist. She insisted that they have lunch so that they could talk. He reluctantly agreed so that she would let him go and he could prevent tragedy. As he rushed off to save the toddler, she admitted to him that the story was a fake. She had spiked the story. He was angry. He told her that The Paper was nothing to fool around with. She answered his anger by challenging him to admit his feelings. She knew that he felt something, but she could tell that he was scared because she knew his secret and she didn't mean his secret about The Paper. His secret was that he was running from himself, running from his feelings for her because he was terrified of the power that she held over him.  
  
Later, she came to his hotel to tell him about the offer from Washington. She wasn't really sure what she expected him to say. Maybe she was sure and she was also in denial. She wanted him to tell her that he didn't want her to leave.  
  
The air was thick between them with an unspoken sexual tension, a tension so electric that the very air seemed to sizzle. Their eyes did a waltz of desire before he pulled her close to him and they kissed so hungrily and so desperately that nothing else mattered. It wasn't about headlines anymore. It was about hearts.  
  
Their kiss continued even after they entered his room. His key was left dangling outside the door like some unwanted orphan.  
  
They continued kissing. His lips never seemed to tire from exploring hers. Then he stopped and pulled away as quickly as he had pulled her close to him. They gazed into each other's eyes, but no words were exchanged. Maybe they both understood. He wasn't going to allow the ecstasy of their kisses, the desire that he felt for her and that he knew she felt for him, to be a prelude to anything more. Physical intimacy for him was about love and commitment. He knew that he had feelings for her, but he wasn't sure if those feelings constituted love. And was he ready to commit to a relationship? He wasn't sure of that either. Until he was sure, a kiss had to be just a kiss.  
  
She spent the night in his room as they both suppressed their desire for each other. The next morning, she emerged from the shower. He greeted her with a wonderful smile. She teased him about his snoring. Cat purred contentedly at her feet. Such a perfect picture of domesticity.  
  
The Paper was always there between them, a silent voyeur watching and listening. As he started for the shower, it looked as if he were going to take The Paper in the bathroom with him. He needed to let it go, he needed to trust her. He allowed himself to be carried on the wings of trust as he placed The Paper on the night stand and headed for the shower.  
  
But The Paper was like a drug to her and she was a helpless addict. She tried fighting it aware of its destructive allure and the potential such curiosity had in destroying his trust in her. However, she succumbed to temptation and stole a peek at the mysterious early edition. The story about "3 teens killed in arson fire" whetted her reporter's appetite. She knew that she was treading on dangerous ground and not only because of the fires caused by the fire. The flames of violating his trust would produce more painful and lasting burns.  
  
After some hairy moments, they escaped from the fire and he was able to save the children. The next day, he stormed into the Sun-Times wanting to know how she happened to show up at the scene of an arson fire predicted by The Paper. She told him that she was following a source. He then demanded to know whether she had looked at The Paper. She gazed into his eyes and evaded his question. She reminded him that she had kept his name out of the story.  
  
Trust, the other "woman" in their relationship, stood silently nearby. Trust was jealous and she was watching and waiting.  
  
In the end, the drug of temptation proved too powerful for the reporter to resist. The Paper was indeed an incredible magnet that had strangled her free will and almost took her life. As she hung precariously from that roof, he implored her to let go of The Paper and reach for his hand. She couldn't. He begged her to reach for his hand. She couldn't. It took more prodding from him, his voice laced with desperation, before she released her death grip on The Paper and allowed the pages to soar unencumbered in the air. And at that moment more than the pages of the Sun- Times had been liberated.  
  
On a train platform, they said goodbye. She had accepted the job in Washington and he had accepted the role that The Paper played in his life. He choked back his tears as he watched her leave on the train taking her to her new life.  
  
Maybe his ideal of having a normal life was just that, an ideal. Maybe he would never again experience the happiness of a romantic relationship. Too bad an early edition didn't have the answers to affairs of the hearts.  
  
Or, maybe it did. Maybe hearts and headlines would never mix.  
  
The End. 


End file.
